Read The Messenger (A Lesbian Romance) for Free Online Page B

slapped a twenty on the bar and rejoined her friends. I worried for a second that she would point me out and that they would all turn to face me with looks similar to the one she gave me, but they carried on none the wiser of my existence, or of the ignorant thing I’d said to their friend. Rabbit must have been right; common sense would dictate that I should remove myself from the bar immediately, but I lingered instead, nursing my drink and letting the music and overheard conversations envelope me like a cloud.  
     

Chapter Nine
    About halfway through my drink, I felt my phone buzz in my purse. Oh, right. The meeting I’d never gone to. I peeked at it. It was Mitchell. The phone felt like an intrusion from a world I was actively trying to block out, so without answering, I turned it off and dropped it unceremoniously into my bag. All that stuff could wait. For now, I was just enjoying the view as the bar became more crowded, and was all but packed with happy, chattering young people. They were so full of life, drinking to have a good time, instead of drinking to escape, which is what a drink had become to me many years ago. Some of them I recognized as bike messengers. I wondered how many of them had come through my office, without so much as a second glance from me.  
    Finally, I felt it was time to go. I would have to face the music sooner or later, and got up to leave just as my second gin and tonic began to warm my veins. As I took a moment outside to let my eyes adjust to the evening light, Rabbit spilled out of the club door. She looked embarrassed to have been caught hurrying. She approached me, quickly pulling herself back to her usual cool self.  
    “Hey.”
    “Hi.” I considered playing it cool, but I was still ashamed by what I’d said to her.
    “Look”, I began. “I didn’t mean to… suppose, I guess you’d call it, earlier. It was a sucky thing to say. I’m sorry.”
    Rabbit looked down at her feet. I couldn’t tell if she accepted my apology, but if the butterflies taking flight anew in my belly were any indication, I was just glad that she was still standing there.  
    “Yeah, it was pretty sucky”, she agreed, kicking around some discarded cigarette butts on the asphalt. “But, it was kind of sucky for me to assume you wanted me to cover your drink. I didn’t mean to be so forward. Can we start over?”  
    Start over ? So she thought something had been started? She looked at me, training her gaze into that spot in my gut that only she seemed to have access to. I would’ve said yes to anything. I swallowed hard and involuntarily looked down at my feet, like I was a freshman in high school all over again.  
    “Sure”, I said, hoping that she couldn’t hear a tremble in my voice. I held out my hand.  
    “Lucy Murphy.”
    She smiled and shook my hand, sending little electric sparks up my arm.  
    “Elena Acevedo.”
    Elena. Elena. How many times has that name tumbled through my lips since then?
    “Not Rabbit?”
    She shook her head and smiled. That smile, perfectly framed in her face. I still see that singular smile in my dreams.  
    “No, that’s just what they call me.”
    “Who’s ‘they’?”
    She gestured to the bar, but I got the impression that she meant all of downtown.
    “Them. Co-workers, friends, people who know me a certain way.”
    That made my heart sink a little. It was presumptuous, of course, to think that I might be anything else to her than someone who’d been nothing but cold and insulting, but I wanted to actually mean something to this young woman. I nodded as though we’d just agreed on something.  
    “Well, nice to meet you, Elena”, I said, turning to leave. Maybe I’d see her around sometime, I thought. However, I didn’t get more than a few steps away before she called out.  
    “Hey!”
    I turned around. She gave a disapproving look to a bouncer that had come out to guard the door and was overseeing our conversation, then jogged over to